Vampiress TV Review: "The Strain"

The Gist:  A CDC Doctor teams with a vampire hunter in order to try to save New York from a plague that is turning people into blood sucking monsters.

Clarification: This series aired on the FX network in the United States from 2014 to 2017 and was based on a graphic novel series of the same name. In it a master vampire devises a plan where he turns the citizens of New York into vampires starting with the passengers on a plane that is transporting him there with the goal of creating an apocalypse for humans

Unlike your standard vampires these are alien like creatures who feed through elongated tongues that can be launched at their prey with stingers on the end.  The stingers also transfer worms which turns the victims into vampires as well so any feeding creates new vampires.

Female Vampire Factor: The biggest issue as far as this blog is concerned is it's explained in season 1 that once a person is turned they lose all humanity to the point that they become different creatures altogether.  By that meaning they don't even have human bodies (including no sex organs) and when they are fully changed they barely look human anymore.

 There are only a few exceptions to this rule. One is that their thirst for blood and stinger develop very early in their transformation so their first feeding they generally still look somewhat human.

The other is situations where the master vampire can chose to give vampires some form of humanity if he feels they would be useful to him as something other than a mindless blood drinking monster.

That Brings us to the estranged wife of the main protagonists, Kelly (Natalie Brown).

Kelly's human looks were restored in the shows second season as the master felt she was special and her looks could be used to lour Dr. Eph and more importantly their son into a false sense of security when she's around. It is explained that when someone is turned the first thing they do is go after the people they love as their memory just associates the people in them as food which Kelly does when she's first turned in season 1, feeding on their babysitter and her kid before looking for her son. The looks Kelly gives when her blood lust gets the best of her shows how great this could have been if they kept their human looks on the show.

 Also the master when he "adopts" Eph and Kelly's son assigns a woman to him who also retains her human looks for his comfort.

From a female vampire standpoint it gets a Vampire Beauty Rating of 2 out of 5.  The two that are there are great though but they are definitely few and far between .  From an entertainment standpoint the shows first few seasons were very good and I highly recommend them.